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DE. GREGORY SMITH^ ON PSYCHOLOGY. 



Herbert Spencer, in taking up the theory of evolution, tries to 

 bridge the gulf between the animal and the human, but this seems to 

 me to be a failure. 



As regards the physical side, he traces out a connection nicely 

 enough, but in his attempt to trace out a connection psychologically, 

 the result does not appear so satisfactorily. 



I should like some criticism of this attempt to apply the theory of 

 evolution in the sphere of psychology. 



Professor Langhorne Orchard said : We shall all agree that, 

 by his able and suggestive address on psychology, the speaker has 

 well deserved our thanks. Some statements, however, call for 

 criticism : — 



I cannot agree that " thought is glorified sensation," even though 

 to the proposition be attached the justly honoured name of Grote. 

 Sensation can never pass into thought. Besides sensation, there 

 must be (in order that thought may be possible) the fundamental 

 mental equipment including the intuition of causality — that every 

 change implies a cause. The first thing a child does is to seek 

 some cause of some sensation. This action, by the child, is thought. 



With regard to ethics and religion, the speaker seemed to think 

 that religion is founded upon ethics. The reverse is the fact. 

 Moral conduct is impossible without character, and character is 

 impossible without thought. The empire of true ethics — the ethics 

 of the supreme moral law — extends to thoughts, purposes, aims. 



I agree with the learned doctor as to the will. This is the person 

 willing — not the same thing as the man himself, but the man making 

 choice and determining. Character is formed by successive choices 

 of will as to how we act in our environment, whatever that environ- 

 ment be. Character, which is the one thing that we carry away 

 into the future world, is the dynamic resultant of a series of will 

 choices. Our primary environment is of course independent of our 

 own arrangement, but we may afterwards modify it and be 

 responsible for doing so, or for not doing so. 



Something was said about imagination and emotion. These 

 things are not independent of will. A foolish boy grows up with a 

 depraved vicious imagination, because he chose to be idle and to 

 regale himself with impure literature. In presence of distress and 

 suffering, I may choose to give vent to emotions of pride and 

 arrogance, or to those of pity and compassion. 



